The Faith of Robert Brooks

This is my testimony.

I grew up in church as a Southern Baptist. My mom raised me as a church-going child and I had a good childhood. But when I got to college and even before college, in high school I started to shy away from the church. What happened was, I didn't have an opportunity to make the decision myself whether or not I wanted to follow Christ or what religion I wanted to follow. I always had it instilled in me by my mom as to who God was and to believe in Jesus. I always put Jesus first and thanked God for everything. Throughout my high school and college career that's what I did. I wasn't a regular church-goer but I always prayed before and after games and blessed my food. It was something instilled in me.

Once I got to the NFL I had many pressures and sins pulling at me. There is a lot of money, limelight, and women associated with the NFL. All those pressures started to wear on me and deteriorate me as a person. Knowing what my mom instilled in me, I knew there was much more to learn about God, but I couldn't figure out how I was going to get it. I grew up in church but I never saw people in church live the life the Bible talks about. I was real confused and had a lot of questions but no answers.

When Reggie White came to Green Bay with his reputation as a preacher, I sat down with him even though I was a sinner. I partied all the time and loved the clubs. I also chased women, and gambled. You name a sin, I was probably doing it. But, I knew there was something inside of me that wanted to know God. Something that didn't want me to continue partying. I remember one night I had a Halloween party at my house. There were lots of women and booze and a lot of other things going on. I went into my room, locked the door and picked up my Bible. I started reading Psalms and Proverbs. I knew I didn't want to be out there partying but I was out there and I was struggling to get away from it all.

A couple days later I talked to Reggie. He asked me if I ever read the Bible to find out what God said about my different questions. I told him no. I never did read the Bible. I said I went to church and heard different verses and a few passages. Right then and there I knew what Reggie was going to tell me. It wasn't enough to hear a few verses now and again. So, I started to read the Bible. When I started reading the Bible things started happening in my life. I also started praying more and praying to the Lord. I said, Lord can you do something in my life to show me who you are and that you are real. I don't want to hear it from a pastor or anybody else. I want to hear from you. Show me who you are and reveal yourself.

I always called myself a Christian even when I wasn't living right, not according to the word of God. So, in the process of reading the Bible things changed. It happened when I saw what God's words said. I didn't have the desire to do the things I would do before. I stopped going out. I said I'm going to take a step to change my life. The word of God says, if you draw nearer to God he will draw nearer to you. It doesn't say God will draw nearer to you first. I think a lot of people think God will just come to them. But God is so righteous and sovereign that he won't try to make you worship him or love him. He loves you because he gave his only begotten son.

I said, I'm going to try this and see if it works. So, when I really started getting into the Scriptures something happened. It got real deep. God showed me a dream. In 1996, I had a dream after the third game of the season. Somebody, who I couldn't see in my dream, told me what was going to happen to me for the next year and a half of my life. It was so strange. When I woke up I knew that the dream was absolutely, positively true. My dream was going to happen.

The first thing I did was tell my best friend. He was the only person I could trust. He came to my house everyday to wake me up and I told him. I was so stunned by my dream that I couldn't just lay in bed. I had to tell somebody if only to verify my story even if they thought I was crazy.

So, I told him my dream. I said, I'm not going to finish the season. Our team is going to win the Super Bowl but I'm going to have a career-ending injury. Then, I'm going to be miraculously healed by God even though the doctors would tell me it would be 14 to 18 months before I could play and run again. The Lord told me to go and have Reggie White pray with me. The minute I pray with Reggie I will be healed from that point on and miraculously come back.

Well, as the '96 season went on and as my dream predicted, I did have my injury and the Packers did win the Super Bowl. But, the weird thing about the dream was that even though I only heard bad news, I knew my status as a football player wasn't going to change. I was actually going to be better off. I can glorify the Lord. I was able to touch other peoples hearts and God was not going to do anything detrimental to my career because I'm glorifying Him.

We did go on to win the Super Bowl and I did heal miraculously. Everything in my dream happened right down to the letter. The funny thing is, the whole dream stopped when we reached the Super Bowl in 1998. I knew in my dream and mentioned it in the book, Leap of Faith 2, that we would go back to the Super Bowl. I had no worries about not playing in the '97 game because we were going back the next year. I had prayed for the Lord to reveal himself to me and after everything happened like the dream said was going to happen, I knew it was the Lord.

I was praying about a church in Arizona. My best friend, Eric, was driving in Arizona at the same time. He had just started reading the Bible because he saw the positive changes in my life. As he was driving, he tried to flag a pretty girl down and ask her out on a date. When he pulled his car over this girl tells him about a church. In the mean time I'm out of town and praying about a church.

My best friend goes back to his apartment and then gets stopped by an old lady who he didn't even know. She tells him he's a nice young man and she knew of a church he would like. It happened to be the same church the girl on the side of the road told him about. I came back to Arizona and he tells me about this stuff. I tell him I've been praying about a church as well. So, we went to this church.

On May 19, 1997, I go to this church. The pastor is preaching and something told me to go to the alter and give my life to Jesus Christ. It told me to publicly claim I am a born-again Christian. I did it and my life changed from then on. We went to Bible study two days later. The pastor was teaching about baptism of the Holy Spirit and I decided to be baptized. That's when the power of God came over me. All I could do was cry. I cried for 15 minutes. My life was transformed. My heart was a 100%. I knew that everything I had read in the Bible and everything that was said to me in my dream was due to the Lord.

The preseason (1997) was about to begin and my brother came up. When I told him about the dream, he thought I was crazy. I knew it was going to happen. So, I said, if you don't believe me, watch how God is going to set the stage for me and give him the glory. It just so happened our first regular season game was on Monday night for all the world to see. That was my first game back. I got injured on a Monday night and the Lord set the stage right back to where it was when I got hurt.

To show my brother that everything I said was true, I guaranteed a win and also guaranteed I would score a touchdown. I told him, after I score my touchdown, I will point to my knee and point toward the sky and give the Lord glory.

When you look back, that is exactly what happened. So, now I live by the word of God and live by the Scriptures. That's what transformed my life. That in a nutshell is my testimony. It goes much deeper than that but that's my testimony.

If you'd like more background and inspiration regarding Robert's Testimonial, check out the book: Leap of Faith 2 by Steve Rose.

This site requires